The Wonderful Western Treatment Plant

April 2015

Today I had the pleasure of birding with the world-travelling, beer-brewing, bird-loving Frenchman Jbeu Martineau (or JB) around the Western Treatment Plant. JB, from France has spent the last few years travelling, living in New Zealand, birding in Tasmania and is now embarking on a four month birding trip up the east coast of Australia.

With first light at 7.15am, we headed straight into the Woodlot on Point Wilson Rd to look for some bush birds. As pretty much 90% of the species we were going to be seeing were new for JB, we were going all out to see as many of Australia's exceptional bird life as we could. Sadly, the Woodlot proved to be rather quiet today mainly - dominated by Red Wattlebird and White-plumed Honeyeater. We did manage to pick a few key species such as Crested Shriketit, Black-faced Cuckooshrike, Grey Shrikethrush and Red-rumped Parrot. Overhead, dozens of Black Kite and Whistling Kite soared and screeched with a guest appearance by an Australian Hobby and Nankeen Kestrel. We also managed to locate a few Sulphur-crested Cockatoo (one of JB's favourite Aussie birds) and a single European Goldfinch perched him in a eucalypt. Looks like it was going to be a good day!

Leaving the Woodlot, we headed down to the T-Section - discussing a few more of JB's specific bird targets. Blue-winged Parrot, Zebra Finch, Brolga, Banded Lapwing, Blue-billed Duck, Hoary-headed Grebe, Striated Fieldwren and any crake or rail species. I remained positive, we should be able to nab all of them with a bit of luck - so fingers crossed. Even though it was Saturday, the farm was still deserted by the time we got into the T-Section. This area, compared to the previous months of the year, seemed empty too! All of the shorebirds have now starting migrating back to the arctic tundra so the ponds that were once choked to the brim with waders, were now bare. Most of these ponds had also been dried up so the only species we found big numbers of were White-fronted Chat, Australasian Pipit, Willie Wagtail and Red-capped Plover. A quick exploration of the dried ponds revealed a party of five Double-banded Plover, a single (late) Marsh Sandpiper, a handful of Red-necked Stint, Silvereye and a lone Black-fronted Dotterel.

The most prominent species were the clouds of Welcome Swallow that seemed to swarm over the T-Section in constant dancing waves. They were soaring over everything and crowding the whole area - I even had one particularly bold bird fly into the side of my head. Once cleared, we rounded the bend to find a very co-operative party of Zebra Finch flitting about next to the road. Target No.1 in the bag! Whilst enjoying this extremely attractive little passerines, our second target, in from of the Blue-winged Parrot, shot overhead calling loudly. Unfortunately the views weren't good enough to be satisfied with, so we left the finches and went after the neophema. On the way past the back ponds, we scanned the waters to find a large number of Hoary-headed Grebe. A pretty common bird throughout Victoria but a target nonetheless!

Luckily for us, on the way out of the T-Section, we had another flock of Blue-winged Parrot shoot up from the side of the road landing considerately in a nice open patch not from our view. Target No. 3 down! JB explained to me how this birds had evaded for his entire time in Tasmania and now they seemed so plentiful. And plentiful they were! For the rest of the day, we watched as flocks of 10-15 birds constantly rocketed over head. By the time we had explored all of the coastal areas, they had become one of the most common species! I estimate we saw around 130 birds that day. Leaving the T-Section, we headed off to the Western Lagoon but not before we picked up a female Flame Robin on the side of the road towards the T-Section grasslands. This was my first Flame Robin for the year. It is normally in late March / early April that this species starts to make its way out of the forests and into open woodlands and farmlands - so was good to get a year tick!

Like the T-Section, the Western Lagoon was reasonably quiet with most of the ponds dried up and devoid of any shorebirds. We did however manage to find a few more Red-necked Stints, two Curlew Sandpipers and a single Common Greenshank wading in Pond 5. The Spit proved to be one of the most rewarded areas of the day with the sand bars completely covered with Black Swan, Grey Teal, Chestnut Teal, Yellow-billed Spoonbill, Great Egret, Little Pied Cormorant, Pied Cormorant and the ever-present Silver Gull. The first highlight came from the Laridae family with good numbers of Great Crested Tern, Little Tern, Fairy Tern and a single Caspian Tern fishing and flying about. For JB the ticks continued to come in and we were having a great time together. To add to the excitement we had great views of a happy little Striated Fieldwren flitting about in the grass on the side of the road. Target No. 4 in the bag!

We continued down to road to my usual spot for crakes and rails. It seemed like luck was on our side today for the moment arrived we heard both Australian Spotted Crake and Lewin's Rail calling out from the swampy coastal scrub. We slowly got out of the car and crept towards the wire fencing looking down into the scrub. The birds continued to call and after a few minutes we got a brief look at an Australian Spotted Crake as it ran through the undergrowth. No sooner had it disappeared did it reappear to left, coming right out into the open to poke around the waters edge. These are such gorgeous birds, with beautiful painted and detailed plumage - it's hard to imagine that they spend their lives run around in oozy, swampy muck! JB was ecstatic and I managed to get my first ever 'usable' photos of a such a tricky little bird. Target No. 5 down! Luckily for us, it stayed around for ages casually wandering around in the open, blissfully unaware of our presence only a few metres away.

As we watched this tiny 20cm beauty running around, suddenly a flash of of orange with zebra stripes jumped through the scrub to the left. It was the incredibly secretive and very difficult to see Lewin's Rail. We froze and I gestured to the spot were it had just run through. To my astonishment, suddenly a second bird appeared a few metres away to the other side. It stood in the spot staring back at both of us, completely unfazed by our staring competition. This is a bird I've only seen about four times, often hearing them from deep in the impenetrable swamp. Well JB and were as excited as each other - what an awesome tick to have under the belt by 9.00am! I was even more excited to manage a couple of shots of this species before it slunk away out of sight. Not only did we have at least two birds running around in the coastal scrub but at least another three calling out constantly from all around us. Seemed like this was the spot for rails and crakes, for as we began to leave a Baillon's Crake joined the chorus. To top it all off, suddenly an eruption of trumpets bellowed across the swamp lands and we were treating to a magnificent pair of Brolga soaring right past us - a very satisfying morning stop indeed!

With now 7 targets and over 45 lifers down for JB, we decided to head out to Beach Rd to look for Banded Lapwing. We were in luck, locating 5 adults in the back paddock being harassed by some magpies. To add to the excitement a pair of Wedge-tailed Eagle soared overhead, wheeling in enormous circles over the fields.

After we had had our fill of the enormous birds of prey, we drove back down Beach Rd and took the coastal route around to Lake Borrie. Finally, we started bumping into a number of birders, including bird guide Paul Hackett from "Melbourne Birding". This was a birder tick for myself, great to finally put a face to a name. The coastal route proved rewarding with fantastic views of White-winged Tern in breeding plumage, good numbers of Great Crested Grebe, Pink-eared Duck and four of Australia's rarest duck species, the Freckled Duck. We also saw our first Australasian Shoveler, Pacific Black Duck, Musk Duck, Royal Spoonbill and Shining Bronze-cuckoo for the day along this route.

Rounding a corner, it came time to add another target species to our list. With a bit of luck on our side we scored a group of Blue-billed Duck ducking and diving into the deep waters on the outskirts of Lake Borrie. We had plenty of females, but were after the striking male with its renowned sky blue bill. Success! As after ten minutes of searching we found a male in the middle pond. Ta-da! The final target species accomplished.

We continued to potter around the farm for another hour or so, picking up a single Bar-tailed Godwit, Horsfield's Bushlark, big numbers of Black-winged Stilt, Red-necked Avocet, Banded Stilt and a immature White-bellied Sea Eagle. That gave us a list of 10 raptor species for a single morning! And of course, Welcome Swallow continued to plague in the area - but who could hate such a gorgeous little bird.

So six hours after we began, we finished with all target species, over 60 lifers and a respectable 95 birds down in our notebooks. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday morning. As we drove back, JB told me about the rest of his birding plans for Australia. He was now going to spend the next four months travelling up the east coast and birding all the way. A month in Victoria, then one in NSW, one in Queensland and then a month in Darwin before selling his car and flying back to France to open his own brewery. What a life - can't wait to hear about all the amazing species he was going to see!